WASHINGTON — As congressional Republicans push to delist gray wolf and grizzly bear populations from Endangered Species Act protections, they now have an ally in the administration who has taken a skeptical view of the law designed for the purpose.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Director Brian Nesvik, who was confirmed in August, has advocated delisting the Greater Yellowstone grizzly bear and said both the bear and gray wolf populations have recovered.

Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., was the sponsor of the latest congressional effort to reduce protections. On the last day before leaving for the holiday break, the House passed her bill that would require the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to reissue a rule that rescinded Endangered Species Act protections for the gray wolf.

The Trump administration finalized the gray wolf’s delisting in November 2020, but the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California vacated it in February 2022 after finding that the Fish and Wildlife Service didn’t demonstrate that the population could be sustained outside of certain areas of the western Great Lakes and northern Rocky Mountains.

The ruling effectively reinstated protections for the wolf population in the lower 48 states. The decision made an exception for the northern Rocky Mountains, where the wolf was delisted by a 2011 act of Congress. Montana, Idaho and Wyoming state officials manage the population in those states.

By requiring the Fish and Wildlife Service to reissue the rule from the first Trump administration, Boebert said her bill would allow all states to set their own management policies.

Supporters of the delisting say the wolf population has sufficiently recovered and that management should be returned to the states. They say wolves, grizzly bears and other predators make it difficult to prevent human-wildlife conflict.

“We can no longer put farmers, ranchers, and even our pets in harm’s way by using taxpayer dollars to protect a species that has been fully recovered,” Boebert said on the House floor. “It’s time for the federal government to get out of the way and allow the state and tribal wildlife agencies to manage the species.”

Congressional Republicans have taken action before to remove endangered species protections for some species.

The House passed a bill in the last Congress identical to Boebert’s, and Rep. Harriet M. Hageman, R-Wyo., sponsored a bill that would delist the Greater Yellowstone population of grizzly bears that the House Natural Resources Committee approved in a 20-19 party-line vote in July.

Other bills and riders in appropriation measures have sought to either delist or prevent the listing of both predators and other species, such as the lesser prairie-chicken, whose listing impacts industry activity.

Supporter of delisting

But the second Trump administration has given congressional Republicans an agency ally in the push to delist predators.

Nesvik was previously director of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, where he advocated delisting the Greater Yellowstone grizzly bear and said both the bear and gray wolf populations have recovered.

Nesvik also told the House Natural Resources Committee in 2023 that human-wildlife interactions were on the rise because the increasing number of bears has caused them to move into “non-suitable habitats,” including farms and backyards.

He intervened in October in a program to import wolves from British Columbia to reintroduce the species to Colorado, an initiative that was approved in a 2020 statewide referendum. Nesvik told Colorado Parks and Wildlife the importation violated an agreement between the state agency and the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Mike Leahy, senior policy director for wildlife, hunting and fishing at the National Wildlife Federation, said he has been pleased that the Trump administration “hasn’t come down too hard on predators yet.”

But the Trump administration will have to decide whether to once again attempt to delist grizzly bears and gray wolves.

“How they handle the pending decision regarding grizzly bears will be interesting and telling,” said Leahy. “I think if they were to propose delisting grizzly bears nationwide, that would be a big mistake and probably lose pretty easily in court.”

Leahy said that instead of legislation to force the delisting of predators, Congress could instead focus on increasing appropriations for programs intended to compensate ranchers, such as the Wolf Livestock Loss Demonstration Project Grant Program.

The Senate’s fiscal 2026 Interior-Environment Appropriations bill would keep the same funding level of $1 million for the program, while the House (HR 4754) would increase it to $2.5 million.

In addition to delisting specific species, Republicans are eyeing further changes to the underlying law. A bill from House Natural Resources Chairman Bruce Westerman, R-Ark., includes changes to the law that would limit courts’ abilities to review delisting decisions.

Westerman’s committee approved the bill, 25-16, on Dec. 17.

He said he hoped to bring the bill to the floor in 2026 or reach a bipartisan agreement with the Senate on changes to the law.

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